As Colorado prepares for annual April 20 festivities, the Colorado Department of Transportation is rolling out a sobering reminder: Drive high, get a DUI. Saturday, April 20 — a date that echoes the cannabis culture slang term “420” — will be host to an assortment of cannabis-themed events through Colorado, which legalized the drug for recreational consumption more than a decade ago. “It is a big week for marijuana consumers in Colorado, and we want to prevent anyone from getting behind the wheel if they’ve been consuming cannabis, alcohol or other drugs,” CDOT Office of Transportation Safety ..read more

OnTheSnow, a popular snow sports website, presented its annual ski area awards on Thursday, April 18, at the Mountain Travel Symposium in North Lake Tahoe, California. Among the seven award winners was Breckenridge Ski Resort, which won the Best Terrain Park award after winning the Best Apres-Ski award last season. Breckenridge earned the award for its three progression-focused terrain parks and the newly upgraded Five SuperChair, which provide park riders fast and easy access to the terrain parks on Peak 8, according to an announcement. OnTheSnow’s Visitors’ Choice Awards are an annual list o ..read more

After fighting through the wind at last week’s meet, the Summit High School track and field team returned to Jefferson County Stadium in Lakewood on Thursday, April 11, for a day that was prime for impressive track and field performances. With the occasional slight breeze and mild springtime temperatures, the Tigers set several new school-record marks and finished at the top of several events to head into spring break with a good amount of energy.  Leading the charge for Summit was senior hurdler Cam Fox, who after months of work was finally rewarded with a school-record time in the 110-m ..read more

Earth Day doesn’t get the same attention as Valentine’s Day, or even Memorial Day for that matter. There are no parades or decorations, but there’s still plenty that can be done to celebrate the holiday that reminds everyone to love the planet.  Earth Day is Monday, April 22, but events are occuring all weekend in Summit County. Save our Snow sustainability bash Arapahoe Basin Ski Area will transform this weekend into a demo village beginning at 9 a.m. Saturday, April 20. For $10, guests will get access to unlimited demos. All proceeds will go to High Country Conservation Center, a Summit ..read more

Long-abandoned mining sites throughout Colorado, many of which appear today as little more than dangerous holes in the ground, will be cleaned up and made safer with funds from a federal grant. The U.S. Department of the Interior’s Office of Surface Mining and Reclamation announced this month that Colorado has been awarded $2.8 million to address the hazards and environmental degradation posed by legacy mining sites. The grants are handed out to states and tribes on an annual basis, according to a news release. An adit at the Bald Grizzly Mine in Chaffee County is among the hazards that federa ..read more

Wednesday marked the day when Summit County’s snowpack usually reaches its historic peak, and the water content trapped in the snow is straddling normal levels thanks to an infusion of snow from a mid-April storm.  Snowpack in the Blue River Basin, which includes all of Summit County, historically peaks on April 17. As of that date, snowpack levels were 100% of the 30-year median, according to data from the Natural Resources Conservation Service.  Despite a small dip, the county’s snowpack was largely insulated from the nosedive experienced in other basins and at the statewide level ..read more

30 years ago: Contest antics go too far at Copper Mountain Resort With shooting fireworks and flaming hoops, male contestants in the 1994 Eenie Weenie Bikini Contest at Copper Mountain Resort took the competition to extremes that will more than likely change the nature of the event. Deputies from the Summit County Sheriff’s Department fined the winner, Dillon resident Joel Godfrey, for lighting fireworks on U.S. Forest Service land without permission. During the contest Godfrey careened down the slope with fireworks shooting from his poles. For the grand finale, he lit another on the front of ..read more

Toss out your tourist brochures and climbing guides, Colorado. NOAA shows up today with some high-tech scissors to give all your fourteeners a 2-foot haircut.  No need to despair, though, Lake City. Sunshine Peak, long rumored to be on the fourteeners’ chopping block when a more precise measurement put the San Juans beauty in its place, is safe at 14,004.5 feet, NOAA says.  In fact, Sunshine got a promotion, leapfrogging Huron Peak at the bottom of NOAA’s 58-entry fourteeners list. Huron now checks in at 14,004.1 feet, the shortest Colorado giant, temporarily humbled but remaining in ..read more

Residents of Dillon, attention! All is not lost. If the vote of the Dillon Town Council to approve the Jake Porritt plan to build a far-too-tall, far-too-large, 200-unit building on the site of the Best Western did not represent your wishes, be on the lookout to sign a referendum petition (if the town’s attorney will approve the wording and release the petition in a timely fashion) to override the 4-to-2 council vote and place this issue on the ballot. It is only fair that the residents of Dillon, many of whom live close by and will be directly impacted by this project, will hav ..read more

In the April 7 article by Robert Tann reporting the discretionary spending of the Summit School District budget, it was shown that the budget was $55,000, the actual spending was $80,700 and the future budget was $75,000. This is an overspending of 46.7%, and a budget increase of 36.3%   Board Member Chris Guarino then goes on to be quoted “We are suggesting making a little bit of an increase to our discretionary budget planning.” Mr. Guarino, overspending by 46.7% and then asking for “only” a 36.3% increase is not a little bit of an increase, and, Mr. Tann, the sub-headline tha ..read more